The public are set to reject the Alternative Vote (AV) in next week’s referendum as support for the current first-past-the-post (FPTP) system remains robust, according to a New Statesman/ICD poll.
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With just a week to go until the vote, the survey gives the No camp a 14-point lead, suggesting that the Yes campaign is running out of time to convince the public to back reform. Among those who say they are certain to vote in the referendum, the poll shows 53 per cent saying No and 39 saying Yes, with 8.7 per cent still undecided. Among all respondents, the No campaign leads by 46 per cent to 34 per cent, with 17 per cent saying they don’t know.
The poll shows that while Liberal Democrat voters are overwhelmingly in favour of reform (66 per cent to 26 per cent) and Conservative voters are overwhelmingly opposed (76 per cent to 19 per cent), Labour voters remain divided, with 47 per cent backing FPTP No and 41 per cent backing AV.
The findings suggest that the latter could yet swing the result in the Yes campaign’s favour. Earlier this week the Labour Yes campaign released a new poster urging the party’s voters to “wipe the smile” off David Cameron and George Osborne’s faces by supporting AV.
Supporters of the Green Party, which is calling for a Yes vote, back AV by 63 per cent to 20 per cent but supporters of the UK Independence Party, which also favours a Yes vote, oppose AV by 64 per cent to 35 per cent. The British National Party, which both sides have claimed would suffer under their system of choice, is calling for a No vote but its supporters back AV by 72 to 18 per cent.
The survey also shows that large numbers of young voters remain undecided. Among those aged 18-24, who say they are certain to vote, 12 per cent say they don’t know which way they will vote. Young voters currently back AV by 59 per cent to 29 per cent, suggesting that the Yes campaign has the potential to increase its support among this demographic.
However, hopes that Scottish and Welsh voters, who currently use the proportional Additional Member System for devolved elections, will vote Yes in large numbers appear to be unfounded. Among those who are certain to vote, Scottish voters currently oppose AV by 50 per cent to 30 per cent and Welsh voters currently oppose AV by 56 per cent to 26 per cent.
In London, where there are no local elections this year, the two sides are neck and neck, with 46 per cent of people planning to vote Yes and 46 per cent planning to vote No.
Datasets: all respondents and certain to vote.
Study carried out by ICD Research, powered by the IDFactor, from April 22nd to April 25th, across an un-weighted sample of 3,467 responses. Final data was weighted to be reflective of UK population aged 18+ by age, gender and region.
ICD Research is a full service market research agency, which in partnership with its sister company the IDFactor owns, manages and builds consumer and B2B panels. To find out more about ICD Research and the IDFactor, visit their websites at www.icd-research.com and www.theidfactor.com